<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>fledgling by TheQueenInTheNorth</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24669346">fledgling</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheQueenInTheNorth/pseuds/TheQueenInTheNorth'>TheQueenInTheNorth</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Vampire, F/M, Pre-Relationship, Vampire Turning</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 05:40:18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,542</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24669346</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheQueenInTheNorth/pseuds/TheQueenInTheNorth</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Kasius thinks he'll probably die in this dark alley something strange attacked him in. Sinara finds him and brings him to safety.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Kasius/Sinara (Marvel)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>fledgling</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Kasius drags himself along the cold, dark alley, towards safety, maybe, or at least away from the – thing – that attacked him. He’d thought it was human, at first. He doesn’t think so now.</p>
<p>He doesn’t think at all. Not about whatever attacked him, not about why it let him get away, not about the rainwater and whatever else there is on the ground soaking into his clothes as he crawls, if it can even be called that. All he knows is his breath is rattling in his throat so loud he can’t hear anything else, his skin should feel cold but it doesn’t, he’s feverish, excruciating pain spreading from the wound on his throat throughout his whole body.</p>
<p>It almost tore him to pieces, that thing, and no matter how he struggled, fought, bit, it did not relent. All it got him was the stale taste of copper in his mouth.</p>
<p>And so he crawls. He crawls and he cries and he tries to breathe.</p>
<p>He’s hungry. He’s so hungry the hunger pangs make it through the mind numbing pain of the wound – the bite mark. It bit him, that thing. Maybe it was hungry, too.</p>
<p>Maybe he isn’t hungry. Just craving something, anything, that will give him the energy to keep going, to get away.</p>
<p>He’s too weak to move fast, too weak to move much longer, too weak to even lift his head to keep his face out of the puddle.</p>
<p>Too weak to shake off the hands that grasp him by the shoulders and drag him around.</p>
<p>He’s dead. There is an angel staring down at him.</p>
<p>He tries to speak but all that comes out is a pitiful groan.</p>
<p>"Did you ingest any blood?"the angel asks.</p>
<p>Her voice is clipped, cold, her face ethereally beautiful but vaguely annoyed.</p>
<p>A strange angel.</p>
<p>She shakes him to get him to focus."Did you swallow any of his blood?"</p>
<p>"Bit,"Kasius gets out.</p>
<p>"I know he bit you,"the not-an-angel says."Did he feed you?"</p>
<p>The word alone makes him ache more, conjures images of gorging himself, of gulping down hot, fresh bl- no, that makes no sense.</p>
<p>"Bit him back,"he clarifies. His head is lolling back and one of her hands slides up the nape of his neck and into his hair to hold him up. She’s ice cold. Not an angel. She smells better than one, though. His stomach clenches."I’m hungry."</p>
<p>Something flashes across her face. It’s gone before he can put a name to it. Her eyes are sad.</p>
<p>"Of course you are,"she says, almost gently, and then she’s on her feet and dragging him up effortlessly.</p>
<p>His arm is around her shoulders, her grip on his wrist all that keeps it from slipping off. He can barely move his feet enough to keep up. She’s supporting his weight like it’s nothing, clicking her tongue like they ought to be moving faster.</p>
<p>It’s as much a blur as all else that night but it’s better, safer. His wound is still throbbing and aching, and he still feels like he’s starving. His breathing isn’t going any easier but somehow it’s not so bad anymore, not getting enough air. What he breathes in smells of her, and she smells nice.</p>
<p>And then they’re in an apartment far too normal for the night he’s had so far and she’s dumping him on the sofa and everything’s spinning – and then she’s on top of him and there’s the flash of a blade and her wrist at his lips, bright blood on pale skin all he comprehends.</p>
<p>He drinks.</p>
<p>The pain dulls. The hunger is sated, at least somewhat.</p>
<p>He whines when she pulls her arm away but he can’t reach for it because her knees pin his arms down.</p>
<p>"You’ve had enough,"she says."He didn’t turn you properly. I had to finish it."</p>
<p>"Finish what?"Kasius asks and licks the last speck of her blood from his lips. The answer doesn’t really matter. He feels better.</p>
<p>She tilts her head."I think you know what."</p>
<p>"That’s not real,"he says, even though he can still taste her blood on his tongue and he is very nearly drunk on the taste."Vampires aren’t real."</p>
<p>She rolls her eyes and pulls her lip up with her thumb, baring a fang."Welcome to my world."</p>
<p>“Thank you,”Kasius says. The weight of her on top of him is comforting. He feels drowsy and vaguely satisfied and somehow, at the same time, ready to bolt. He blinks up at his guardian angel; it is very clear he would have died in that alley if not for her.“I’m Kasius.”</p>
<p>“Sinara,”she says. She strokes his cheek and down his throat to the bite mark, making him shiver.“Try to sleep, Kasius.”</p>
<p>He wants to protest but he is much too exhausted to form another word and she smells so good and the coppery taste lingering in his mouth is more like the remnants of a fine wine.</p>
<p>He sleeps.</p>
<p>He wakes with a gasp, his teeth too sharp, too big for his mouth, and so, so hungry. He struggles against the arms around him but then something presses against his lips and he goes limp, Sinara’s scent registering. His fangs - he has fangs - he has fangs, and they withdraw, and he desperately gulps down her offering. Her fingers brush his cheek as he drinks from her wrist.</p>
<p>He’s cradled against her chest, her head resting atop his as she coos soothing words he can’t bring himself to understand.</p>
<p>This time, he manages to keep the whine in when she pulls her arm away, even if he desperately wants to continue feeding. Nothing has ever tasted as good as her blood. Nothing has ever smelled as good as her.</p>
<p>“It’ll get easier,”Sinara says.“Do you think you’re up for a shower?”</p>
<p>Once he’s cleaned the filth of the streets off of his skin, his mind seems to clear, too. He should have questions, he knows, and he does have them, but his main concern is not the thing that attacked him nor his new fangs nor his thirst for blood. He’s afraid Sinara will ask him to leave. A fear he recognises as absurd but cannot assuage.</p>
<p>He wraps himself in the bathrobe she left him and steps out to find she has set up a meal for them.</p>
<p>“We don’t need any real food,”she says as she gestures for him to sit.“I still like having some. The steak’s extra rare, of course.”</p>
<p>He smiles at her and sits down, accepting the glass she hands him.</p>
<p>He grimaces as he takes a sip. It tastes of blood and not in the nice way hers does.</p>
<p>“Frozen. Fresh is better.” Sinara shrugs and drinks from her glass anyway.“Of course, you might just be having trouble adjusting from mine. I hear nothing quite compares to your sire’s blood. I suppose that’s me, since Hive didn’t finish the job on you.”</p>
<p>Not even half of that makes any sort of sense.</p>
<p>“Hive?”he asks.</p>
<p>“Vamp that attacked you,”she says. She’s eating her steak with knife and fork, small, delicate bites. Her fangs aren’t visible.“Very old. Powerful. A few drops are enough when it’s his blood but sometimes they only go halfway, no longer human, not really a vamp. He’s turning people. For fun, I think. Or some sort of army. He lets them run feral.”</p>
<p>“Oh.” He turns his attention to his plate. He never liked steak so bloody. Now, his mouth waters.“And what about you?”</p>
<p>He’s not sure what he’s asking but he wants her to keep talking. Hearing her, smelling her, feeling her foot accidentally brush his under the table - it grounds him. It stops the thoughts of leaving the apartment to find a throat to sink his fangs into.</p>
<p>“I kill them when they start rampaging. Used to be a hunter.” She sees the look on his face and clarifies,“Human aware of the supernatural and stopping the dangerous bits. Hive got me, too.”</p>
<p>“Then why aren’t you feral?”</p>
<p>“Locked myself up nice and secure.” She downs her glass like it’s liquor. Her eyes are so sad he almost wants to apologise.“One last monster away from humanity. That was the plan. Smashed my way out eventually instead but the hunger had stopped by then. Now I’m back to hunting.”</p>
<p>“Why turn me, then?”he asks.</p>
<p>“As opposed to?”</p>
<p>“Killing me.”</p>
<p>Her lips quirk into something that is almost a smile.“You weren’t a monster yet. Besides, this gets lonely and you smelled nice, under the dirt.”</p>
<p>“You smell nice, too,”he says, and blushes. He’s surprised he even can blush. It does not seem like a very vampire-like thing to do.</p>
<p>“Sense of smell heightens ridiculously,”Sinara says.</p>
<p>She gives him a real smile. He returns it without second thought.</p>
<p>Sinara reaches across the table and squeezes his hand.“It’ll be alright.”</p>
<p>He believes her. Whether it’s his being calling out to his sire or something else, he can’t imagine anything truly being wrong, so long as she is with him.</p>
<p>Decades later, he can only agree with his assessment of that first night.</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>